ABOUT US

History & Mission

According to SpayUSA, every day over 70,000 puppies and kittens are born in the United States, compared to only 10,000 humans. Over half of those are unintended litters. As long as these unwanted litters continue, there will be neglected, abused, and abandoned dogs and cats. As a result of this uncontrolled reproduction, over 8 million healthy or treatable dogs and cats enter U.S. shelters every year. Over 4 million of those are not lucky enough to be quickly adopted and are euthanized.

Spay/Neuter is the Solution.

By preventing unwanted litters from ever being born, fewer unwanted litters are born and therefore fewer homeless dogs and cats end up in over-burdened shelters where they face euthanasia.

Spay/Neuter Benefits the Community.

Stray and roaming animals can be dangerous to the community; they may bite and attack other pets and people and cause vehicular accidents by running across roads. Communities spend millions of dollars to control unwanted animals, including the fees of dog wardens and the costs to collect, house and feed the homeless animals. According to the Humane Society of the United States, it costs an average of $176 to collect, shelter and euthanize a single animal. In Hamilton County alone, over $1 million is spent annually on animal control and dog warden services. This does not include indirect amounts spent by our health, fire and police departments on animal-related issues and by our courts on animal abuse/neglect cases. So, even if you don’t own a pet, you still pay for this. And, since it is money spent to treat symptoms and not causes, you’ll pay for it again year after year.

Our Story

UCAN was founded in 2001, to stop the endless cycle of unwanted births and euthanasia. The two main reasons people do not sterilize their pets are cost and lack of access to spay/neuter services. UCAN solves both of these issues. We provide low-cost spay/neuter services and free transports to our clinic from several locations in Southwest Ohio, Northern Kentucky and Southeast Indiana.

In 2007, UCAN opened a nonprofit high-volume, low-cost spay/neuter clinic on West 8th Street in Queensgate. The clinic is based on the North Carolina Humane Alliance's high-volume, high-quality, low-cost model which has been implemented successfully in other communities around the country.

In 2014, thanks to a generous capital grant from The Joanie Bernard Foundation, UCAN purchased its own clinic facility, located at 2830 Colerain Avenue, which opened on June 30, 2014.

The surgeries UCAN has completed since it opened in April 2007, have prevented hundreds of thousands of unwanted dogs and cats from being born into abuse, neglect and euthanasia.

How We Know That What We Do Works...

Numerous studies show that the intake rate at shelters significantly decrease when low-cost spay/neuter services are available in the community.

After 4 years of using UCAN’s free transport service, the Grant County Animal Shelter reduced its intake of both dogs and cats by more than half!